Notes from the Road: Pit Stops, Part I

Good thing I don't have a large readership. This sort of tardy writing would drive them all away. In my defense I've been very busy unpacking my car (which took half an hour), undergoing various interviews to determine my employment future [another post altogether], and spending a lot of time trying to get my 15-month-old nephew to like me best. Updates on that shall be forthcoming.

Depending on different factors (how badly I have to go to the bathroom, whether or not I decide to put real clothes on or do some housework at any given point) this could be a two-parter. I haven't decided (read: I don't have to pee that badly yet).

I left Tulsa on a Sunday, around 7 am. The planned breakdown (actually given my history with road trips that is an exceptionally poor word choice) was as follows:

-Sunday: Tulsa to Columbia, MO (5.5 hours)

-Monday: CoMo to St. Louis (2 hours)/St. Louis to Indianapolis (4.5 hours)

-Tuesday: Indy to Newark, Delaware (12 hours)

-Thursday: Newark to Bloomfield (5 hours)

Wednesday I planned to spend recouping from Tuesday's drive by hanging out with Sharayah and Jason before driving home to Connecticut on Thursday.

Of course I told my family I wouldn't be in til Sunday. SNEAKY.

Anyway, those distances there? I beat all of them except for the last one, and that last one only went over because I had to drive through New York on the Cross-Bronx Expressway. Which I loathe will all my being. There was traffic after the GWB, too, and into Fairfield County. But aside from that last leg, the highways were (mostly) clear and the driving was smooth. Such are the benefits of interstate travel on 4th of July weekend. Hooray for holiday driving!

The best part about this trip (that is already a lie, I can't pick a single best thing) was getting to stop and see friends and family during my non-driving hours. This post is supposed to be a rundown of those breaks. Let's get to it now.

In Columbia I stayed with Mo. Columbia, strictly speaking, is not on the route back to CT, but I always go here first. It's tradition to include Mo in some aspect of a roadtrip. During my college years (still love saying that) I spent countless hours/vacations on the road with her or crashing at her parents' house. PLUS this was my last time seeing her as a Single Lady. Hooray for the impending nuptials!

Impending Nuptials formed the focal point of our all-too-brief time together. After reaching her house and dropping off my things we hit the road again for a whirlwind afternoon of dropping off invitations, meeting with photographers, sample hour at Sam's Club (it's tradition, don't judge), and stopping by the Impending Groom's apartment to pick up/drop off various items. Then followed an evening of making wedding send-off/favors while eating cookies baked by the I.G. and watching BBC's new Sherlock Holmes. In short, it was delightful.

Stop 2 was The Roman Residence in St. Louis. I happened to arrive the day after their one-year anniversary, so lunch was a fairly laid-back affair consisting of Nate's Secret Ingredient Burgers and about three episodes of The Big Bang Theory, Season 3. We vetoed a walk in favor of vegging on the couch. It may be instructive to note that whenever possible I will probably opt for vegging on the couch.

Post-lunch (and post-stop-for-a-caffeinated-beverage) I turned North and East to stay Monday night with my cousins, expectant parents Mike and Meagan. There were plans in the offing to go see fireworks--but Meagan was pregnant and I was wiped after driving. I don't know what Mike's excuse was. We ate grilled cheese sandwiches and played this game, which by some astonishing stroke of beginner's luck, I won. I fell asleep on the couch to the intermittent rumblings of fireworks. It was glorious.

Notes from the Road: On the Radio

[Some notes after my four day drive, beginning in Tulsa, OK, and ending up in Connecticut.]

I frequently hit 'scan' on my radio console to help me stay awake on my solo trek. Five-second blips of song mingled with intermittent bursts of static and raucous dj squawks will do a lot to keep you going without overdosing on caffeine. (That, and turning the ac to its coldest and strongest settings and freezing yourself for thirty seconds.)

With that said, here is a rough rundown of the most overplayed (or overblipped) songs across the radio stations of America:

-Katy Perry, Extraterrestrial (ET), Last Friday Night, Firework (Ms. Perry was far and away the winner of this overplay showdown)

-Black-eyed Peas, Just Can't Get Enough

-Adele, Rolling in the Deep

-Train, Save Me San Francisco

-Britney, some godawful guttural techno that I never figured out the name to

-Ke$ha, Blow

-The Script, Break Even

-OneRepublic, Secrets/The Good Life (only other artist [besides KP] to get two frequently played numbers)

-Bruno Mars, The Lazy Song

-Taylor Swift, Mean

-Ceelo Green, F You

Most of these are wretched. "The Lazy Song." Britney's "music." Anything Ke$ha has ever, ever done, or will do. It was nice to hear Adele getting so much air time, but even so, it got pretty old, pretty fast.

On the other hand, sometimes scans would yield gems:

-WHAM!, Careless Whisper

And that's all I need to say about that.

More notes from the road possibly in the future. For now, I must needs unpack.

Burning bridges

Two people can live through an identical experience and be affected in utterly dissimilar ways.

I grew up with two loving parents, enough food, clothing, and shelter, and a houseful of siblings. Any way you slice it, I have no room for complaining about my childhood, and I don't intend to.

Everyone, however, has bad experiences. Mine came in the form of church leadership. My home church experienced a roller coaster of screwball stuff, but it survived. That church was my world growing up, and the damage done to the congregation went past what it might have in a larger or less involved group of people. By the grace of God the church has become what it was supposed to be: a place full of joy, and laughter, and music, and Christ. But what takes an institution a few office changes (and the power of God) to overcome can take an impressionable child years to shake.

So, I've had my share of baggage. Trust issues. Bad memories and connections. Knee-jerk ideological reactions. But--especially in the past couple of years--I've learned how to uncork some of those memories. I know I don't carry around much of that baggage anymore. The past has weighed me down. Has pushed and pulled me and contributed to making me who and what I now am. I've recognized that--but I have ceased to believe that it's the greatest defining factor of my existence, or of my childhood relationships.

Still hurts to think about, though, and I'm thinking about it today. Especially how differently others who lived out the crazy are now reacting to it. I stumbled on something written by an old and very dear childhood friend and reading what she had to say about the past that we share made me feel as if I'd been given a swift kick to the solar plexus. She's moved on, has created her own idea of what it means to be free of the past. But moving on and healing, while sometimes synonymous, aren't always. Sometimes you have to live with a hurt in order to get better. You have to examine what's wrong. Gangrenous limbs need to be cut off, yes; but a broken arm can be set, made strong again.

Some of the really good memories--the ones with no hurts attached--come from time spent with this friend. I don't want or mean to judge her, or to sound judgmental. Our experiences were certainly not identical, and maybe not even comparable. Maybe for her amputation was the only solution. It's just that someday I pray that she and I can sit down together somewhere, can look each other in the eye, with nothing obstructing the view.

End Times

Back for my last stint in T-town.

I'm ready to move on.

If humans ever really colonized space I would so be down for relocating. (As if we haven't already. I'm looking at you, GOVERNMENT.)

But before I bound about the rocky hills of Mars I think I would enjoy going to Ireland or something. Lots of somethings.

I bought a dress while I was home this past weekend. I wonder what it would be like to just go and buy an article of clothing without having a fight with the price tag first. (At the mall I mean. I have no particular desire to wear anything worth anywhere near as much as, say, my car.)

It's a goodlooking dress. I look good in it. It looks good on me. This is an agreeable state of things. Now to find shoes that agree with the both of us: we'll see how that goes.

I bet that dress would look awesome on me on Mars.

But I've got to get out of Tulsa first.

And another thing

Addendums (addendi?) to previous post:

13. The weather this week has been unseasonably cool for Tulsa in May; it's as though we are having an actual springtime! Which means on my early runs at Lafortune I can smell honeysuckle and cold morning air, which is one of the best of all good things.

14. I have free time to read novels! And have conversations with good friends!

15. I bought shorts today! This is Somewhat Miraculous.

16. I have to change Thad's oil and get him realigned (categorized with packing the apartment and applying for jobs: by adding it to the list I will generate excitement within myself!)!